Solar rising: Minnesota energy bill includes 1.5% more solar energy - Minneapolis Green Party
1. Solar rising: Minnesota energy bill includes 1.5% more solar
energy - Minneapolis Green Party
Minnesota took a leap forward toward solar energy Friday - or perhaps a teeny tiny step - depending
on your perspective.
Those advocating for more solar power in Minnesota are celebrating the Legislature's new mandate
requiring investor-owned power utilities to increase by 1.5% the amount of power they generate
from solar by year 2020.
That 1.5% would mean as much as 30-fold increase in solar power over what Minnesota generates
now - but it's a 30-fold increase of a very small amount. The state's total solar output is just 13
megawatts. Source
Compare that to the top three solar-generating states: California, 1,033 megawatts, Arizona, 710
megawatts and New Jersey 415 megawatts. The bottom line, however, is that Minnesota will start
generating more clean, renewable solar energy, a critical move in the right direction, say advocates
for renewables in the state.
Even so, the 1.5% mandate has left many frustrated - both among those who want more solar power
and those who want nothing to do with it. The former say 1.5% in not nearly enough, and the latter
are predicting a variety of dire consequences, including higher energy bills and lost jobs.
Unfortunately, or because making public policy is the art of compromise, many of energy efficiency
Minnesota's biggest users of dirty coal-generated power have received a get out of jail free card, so
to speak - or perhaps we should say - a license to keep polluting pass.
These include all rural electrical cooperatives, including Roseau Electric Cooperative here in
northwest Minnesota. All municipal power companies are also exempt, as are some of our state's
biggest polluters, such as the mining industries of the Iron Range, paper mills and others.
The riders or "carve-outs" of the new legislation means that roughly one-third of all Minnesota
residents and businesses are not included in the new mandate.
Several key aspects of the bill, however, suggest that individual citizens don't have to wait around
for their sandbagging local power company to get free of its addiction to dirty energy.
Individual citizens can take their own initiative and action because the bill provides new incentives,
including:
o New inducements for rooftop solar installations for residential homes.
o Improvements in the PACE financing program to help businesses invest in energy improvements
including on-site renewable energy.
o A "Value of Solar Tariff," which would establish a price for solar that assesses the overall value of
solar, making individual solar projects easier to finance.
And much more.
2. The challenge to bring more clean, renewable solar energy to Minnesota is only beginning. Plans
still call for a 40% solar-energy profile by year 2030.
It's clear from reaction to the solar bill by several groups, including Republicans in the Legislature,
the Chamber of Commerce and conservative groups such as the Center of the American Experiment,
that they intend to fight solar power every step of the way - but even a tiny 1.5% increase means the
solar genie is out of the bottle, never to be put back in.
SEE ALSO:
NET METERING MINNESOTA
SOLAR "CARVE OUTS" FOR POLLUTERS
THE "GLOBAL COOLING" MYTH OF THE
1970S
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